Sharing some of what I talk about, and learn, in my private therapy sessions. I am blessed with a wonderfully supportive psychiatrist who provides me with both medication advice and therapy. I am hoping my experiences in my sessions can help someone else.

Sunday, March 09, 2008

Surging Creativity

Over the past week I have felt my mood and energy lift immensely. This feeling has produced and overwhelmingly intense surge of creative energy. I say overwhelming because the ideas are coming faster than I can even begin the paintings.

I took a class the other day where I learned how to stretch my own canvases for painting. Yesterday I went out and spent a small fortune on the tools, canvas, stretcher bars a staple gun, a few ready made canvases, more paint (even though I have lots of paint) and anything else at the store I decided I "needed".

I have so many great ideas for paintings, today, before I start a new one, I am going to actually try to finish the one I'm in the middle of (and have been for the last 2 months). I love this feeling. It feels like I am back. The real me is creative and energetic, and passionate and excited about everything around me.

The real me sees intense beauty in all the little things that surround me, the puddle of water being used as a birdbath by a robin returning for spring, the willow tree buds popping up each day turning weeping branches of the tree a beautiful shade of light yellow/green, the crocuses popping through the lawns, the mountain's winter water runoff racing down the river searching for the sea, the bald eagle soaring above the farm, climbing to heights that seem impossible and coming together to mate mid air, falling to the ground faster than Icarus fell as his wings melted in the sun. The eagles manage to part ways before hitting the ground and then soar higher and higher and begin their dance again. It is beautiful.

Despite this beauty, and despite my lift in mood I am thinking a lot about suicide, maybe a better description is having suicidal imagery stuck in my head. These ideas are fixing themselves into my artwork. I do not understand why, when I feel so much better.

About Me

I am currently a lost soul on its quest for freedom. I have a mental illness; Chronic Major Depressive Disorder. My version of MDD sits somewhere in the Bipolar Spectrum, meaning my mood cycles between severe depression and then up high, very high, but not high enough to be considered hypomania. I am hoping to help myself and others who read this blog both understand this illness better and to learn something about ourselves in the process.